Sickness/Injury Payments and Conditions

A) NOTIFICATION OF INCAPACITY FOR WORK 

1) You must notify us by telephone on the first day of incapacity at the earliest possible opportunity and by no later than 9.00am. Text messages and e-mails are not an acceptable method of notification. Other than in exceptional circumstances notification should be made personally, to your immediate Manager. You should call by no later than 4.00 pm. to advise on whether you intend on returning to work the following day. 

2) You should try to give some indication of your expected return date and notify us as soon as possible if this date changes. The notification procedures should be followed on each day of absence unless you are covered by a medical certificate.  

3) If your incapacity extends to more than seven days you are required to notify us of your continued incapacity once a week thereafter, unless otherwise agreed. 

B) EVIDENCE OF INCAPACITY 

1) Medical certificates are not issued for short-term incapacity. In these cases of incapacity (up to and including seven calendar days) you must sign a self-certification absence form on your return to work. 

2) If your sickness has been (or you know that it will be) for longer than seven days (whether or not they are working days) you should see your doctor and make sure he/she gives you a medical certificate and forward this to us without delay. Subsequently you must supply us with consecutive medical certificates to cover the whole of your absence. 

C) PAYMENTS 

1) You are entitled to statutory sick pay (SSP) if you are absent for four or more consecutive days because of sickness or injury provided you meet the statutory qualifying conditions. SSP is treated like pay and is subject to normal deductions. 

2) Qualifying days are the only days for which you are entitled to SSP. These days are normally your working days unless otherwise notified to you. The first three qualifying days of absence are waiting days for which SSP is not payable. Where a second or subsequent period of incapacity (of four days or more) occurs within 56 days of a previous period of incapacity, waiting days are not served again. 

3) Where the circumstances of your incapacity are such that you receive or are awarded any sum by way of compensation or damages in respect of the incapacity from a third party, then any payments which we may have made to you because of the absence (including SSP) shall be repaid by you to us up to an amount not exceeding the amount of the compensation or damages paid by the third party and up to, but not exceeding, any amount paid by us. 

D) RETURN TO WORK 

1) You should notify your immediate Manager as soon as you know on which day you will be returning to work, if this differs from a date of return previously notified. 

2) If you have been suffering from an infectious or contagious disease or illness such as rubella or hepatitis you must not report for work without clearance from your own doctor.  

3) On return to work after any period of sickness/injury absence (including absence covered by a medical certificate), you are also required to complete a self-certification absence form and hand this to your immediate Manager. 

4) Upon returning to work after any period of sickness/injury absence, you may be required to attend a “return to work” interview to discuss the state of your health and fitness for work. Information arising from such an interview will be treated with strictest confidence. 

E) GENERAL 

1) Submission of a medical certificate or sickness self-certification absence form, although giving us the reason for your absence may not always be regarded by us as sufficient justification for accepting your absence. Sickness is just one of a number of reasons for absence and although it is understandable that if you are sick, you may need time off, continual or repeated absence through sickness may not be acceptable to us. 

2) In deciding whether your absence is acceptable or not, we will take into account the reasons and extent of all your absences, including any absence caused by sickness/injury. We cannot operate with an excessive level of absence as all absence, for whatever reason, reduces our efficiency. 

3) We will take a serious view if you take sickness/injury leave which is not genuine, and it will result in disciplinary action being taken. 

4) If we consider it necessary, we may ask your permission to contact your doctor and/or for you to be independently medically examined.